


Lifewish

by jadzeanna



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Depression, M/M, Pining, Whump, something about martyrdom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-26
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:26:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22800199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jadzeanna/pseuds/jadzeanna
Summary: “You got a death wish?” Trip asks.
Relationships: Malcolm Reed/Charles "Trip" Tucker III
Comments: 7
Kudos: 13





	Lifewish

**Author's Note:**

> In response to an anonymous prompt: "You got a death wish?" with tuckerreed ([on my tumblr](https://osmoticeel.tumblr.com/post/173339682282/you-got-a-death-wish-with-tuckerreed))
> 
> Edited & posted 19 Feb 2020

“You got a death wish?” Trip asks.

Every time, it’s like he thinks Malcolm needs a reminder of the time they almost died, the time they risked their lives to save each other, the time they shared stories of their pasts, and Trip heard more than Malcolm had ever told anyone. The time they huddled close, their breath intermingling even as the oxygen in the cabin dwindled. He’d thought about asking to kiss him then. He could have made some excuse about staving off frostbite, just to feel Trip’s lips under his while he still had a chance. But even as he’d seen himself dying, Malcolm hedged and lied and never quite said it.

Is it a death wish, if almost-dying promises you a chance you never knew you wanted, and now long for so desperately it hurts?

But there’s never a good time to say it, so Malcolm dodges a spray of sparks flying from his console and replies, “I wish those Klingons firing at us were dead.”

* * *

“You got a death wish?” Trip asks.

Malcolm has never been anything less than pragmatic. Even when Trip chided him for risking his life to save them all, it was always a calculated move – calculated to keep Trip safe. He’s the one beautiful thing that matters in Malcolm’s life.

He’s never had a death wish, not until he saw how Trip’s eyes look when he smiles, lit by starlight, and knew he had found something worth dying for.

But there’s never a good time to say it, so Malcolm shrugs it off without even a response, and dives into the thick of battle.

* * *

“You got a death wish?” Malcolm asks.

Trip tries to laugh, but all he manages is a cough. It sounds absolutely nasty. Plasma burns in his lungs, Phlox said. He’ll be lucky if he makes it until morning. Malcolm is sitting next to his bed in sickbay, wondering how he failed as a security officer, how he let things get so wrong.

Malcolm never wanted to die – he just wanted Trip to live. And so he squeezes Trip’s hand, as Phlox putters over him in sickbay, and he tries not to shake when Trip reaches a hand that tenderly brushes his cheek before resting on his shoulder. A tear falls onto Trip’s chest, and Malcolm knows he’s failed. All his attempts to hide it, undone by a single gesture.

“It was always you, you know.”

Malcolm isn’t sure why he’s saying it, when he knows Trip can’t reply, but the words have started coming out and there’s no force in the galaxy that could stop them now.

“You always asked if I had a—" Malcolm has to take a deep breath and steel himself to continue. “If I had a death wish. Ever since those two days when we were trapped in deep space with nothing but each other and a dwindling oxygen supply, you always thought I was ready to die. I… I never wanted to die. Never. But…”

Another tear falls. Malcolm wonders if Trip even understands what he’s trying to say.

“I should have been there, to stop the invaders. That’s my job, dammit. I never had a death wish.” He swallows, though his throat is dry. “I just wanted you to live.”

Trip smiles, damn him, and Malcolm has half a mind to slap some sense back into the man, but instead, Malcolm just presses his lips to Trip’s for a long moment. He wonders whether getting that point across was worth it, until he feels Trip’s hand in his hair. It’s the first time he’s felt Trip shaking, and Malcolm can’t stand it, not at all. He wants to stand up and run from sickbay, but those beautiful eyes insist he can’t leave, and so he keeps holding Trip’s scorched hand, wondering why it took him so long to realize what was right in front of him all along.

* * *

Malcolm idly considers seeking out death, after they disembark back on Earth. He could get a dangerous job; there are plenty of those for a security officer. But instead he moves on, finds another starship posting, does what he’s good at. This time he makes sure to talk to his crew members a little more, smile a little more, try his best to remember how it feels to want to live.

It’s what Trip would have wanted.


End file.
